Thursday, February 17, 2011

Spot-breasted Openbills!

On Monday 14/2/11 I organized a large team of ringers, and we headed down to Hameyshar Plains. Our main mission was to study the Thick-billed Larks there. We arrived early, set the nets up with frozen fingers, and pretty soon we had an amazing catch of 17 birds! This is the first time TBL's have been ringed in Israel, and probably very few (if any) have been ringed elsewhere in the world. As literature on them is so limited, we measured and photographed each individual extensively. We obtained some interesting data on ageing and sexing. I wrote with Yosef Kiat a short article, that can be downloaded for free here.

Look at this amazing bill! I wonder what do they need such huge bills for; desert seeds are usually small and thin-coated.

What a bird!

They bite! This is Yotam's finger:

I had to leave rather early to a meeting at Eilat, and after I left the guys caught this Asian Desert Warbler. Thanks Yosef for the image!